Meet the group trying to get Taiwanese to take risk of war seriously – South China Morning Post Feedzy

A civil training organisation is trying to prepare Taiwanese to prepare for any conflict with the Chinese mainland.

The group is not a militia, does not teach people how to use guns and dismisses claims that it is advocating war with Beijing. Instead, it says its focus is on teaching people how to survive in the event of conflict and help others.

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“Such training is crucial, especially when Taiwan is known as one of the world’s most dangerous flashpoints for conflict,” said Puma Shen, co-founder of the Kuma Academy, a name that means bear in Japanese.

Despite the serious threats and warnings from analysts in Taiwan and the United States that a conflict could erupt within a few years, the Taiwanese public’s response has remained mild as most of them do not think a war will happen if the cross-strait status quo remains in place.

Beijing views Taiwan as a breakaway province that must be brought back under its control – by force if necessary.

“I don’t blame them as no textbooks here teach students of such a risk,” Shen, an expert on disinformation who teaches criminology at National Taipei University said in an interview.

“This was why we decided to set up Kuma Academy to increase public awareness of the threat of a Chinese attack and preparedness for a potential conflict.”

The financially strapped group was set up in April 2021 by Shen and four other partners and initially remained low-profile.

It was only able to hold its first series of events – mainly forums and courses – between late 2021 through early 2022 with the first NT$50,000 (US$1,600) grant it received from the government-funded Taiwan Foundation for Democracy.

The Russian invasion of Ukraine in February last year gave the group a chance to draw public attention to the need to prepare for war, Shen said, adding this allowed the organisation to find more funding sources.

Later that year, the visit to Taipei by then US House speaker Nancy Pelosi – a trip Beijing saw as a violation of its sovereignty and a breach of the US one-China policy – brought cross-strait tensions to the boil.

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“We started a crowdfunding campaign in July, and China’s military response to Pelosi’s visit a month later drastically boosted our fundraising efforts as many people who were unhappy with the Chinese reactions donated funds to us,” Shen said.

In addition to sending warplanes to the Taiwanese air defence identification zone in greater numbers and crossing the median line that separates the island and the mainland in the Taiwan Strait on an almost daily basis, the People’s Liberation Army has also staged live-fire drills around the self-governed island.

These included an unprecedented series of exercises – some involving ballistic missiles – in six zones encircling Taiwan that went on for more than a week after Pelosi’s visit in August last year.

The United States, Taiwan’s informal ally and biggest arms supplier, later rebuked Beijing for its actions, calling them “provocative and irresponsible.”

Like most countries, the US does not recognise Taiwan as an independent state but is opposed to any change to the cross-strait status quo by force. It is also legally bound to help the island defend itself.

“Many people mistake Kuma Academy for a militia. We have no intention of forming a [civilian] troop … Nor do we teach people how to use guns in battle or give them guns. We do not have guns,” Shen said, dismissing claims that the academy is a violent group advocating war with the mainland.

“The academy is more like a school. We organise large-scale activities to allow people and their children to be aware of the importance of civil defence.”

Its curriculum includes teaching people the basics about military operations, ways to protect themselves and help others, what to put in a survival kit and how to tell which places are safe to hide in an emergency.

One major course is to teach people to identify misinformation on social media and other platforms, which Shen says Beijing has been using to induce anxiety, confusion and chaos to intimidate the island.

He said interest in the academy’s programmes has grown markedly since Russia invaded Ukraine, while the Israel-Gaza war that began with Hamas’s attack in October further fuelled public interest.

The organisation says the number of people taking its courses has now reached 30,000 – a marked increase on the 50 or so who had signed up in late 2021.

To continue its operations, the academy has rallied support from local firms to form a “civil defence national team” to supply survival kits and other items that can be used in emergencies, Shen said. These will then be sold to raise funds.

“Our goal is to have at least several million people attending our classes and events,” Shen said, adding it is important to increase public awareness of the importance of civil defence so that the government would be able to recruit enough people to help in their civil defence programmes in the event of a potential conflict.